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Three Carol-Anthems

Recordings

Howells’ ‘Coll. Reg.’ settings immediately set the benchmark for twentieth-century liturgical composition and led to the composer being besieged by requests from cathedrals and collegiate chapels for other such ‘custom-built’ settings. A generous ...» More

A true master and exponent of the British choral music tradition, Herbert Howells' compositions and settings are brought to life in this collection of his secular and sacred works. Performances come from the youthful talents of The Rodlofus Choir, ...» More

'A gloriously sung collection … captures the tranquil pastoral mood of Christmas Eve. The recording could hardly be bettered' (The Penguin Guide ...'Polyphony is superb … the most completely recommendable new issue for Christmas I've found so far' (The Independent on Sunday)» More

'Stephen Layton directs the performances and deserves major credit for the very high standards evident on this compilation' (BBC Music Magazine)'This is a disc for listening to in peace, after the Christmas Day festivites are over and the visitors have gone' (The Daily Telegraph)» More

'David Hill's Advent programme imaginatively mingles antiphons, carols, hymns and motets. Favourites alternate with relative rarities such as Edward N ...'This recording holds some of the most exquisite choral singing I have ever heard. They must be one of the finest choirs in England. Not only is the t ...» More

Hyperion’s series of St Paul’s recordings is graced by an addition dedicated to music for Epiphany. The programme embraces music from the sixteenth to the twentieth century, from Bach to Bingham, and includes many long-established favourites by We ...» More

'What Sweeter Music' is a real festive treat, with a sumptuous collection of songs and carols for Christmas—touching on traditional favourites (Silent Night, Away in a Manger), modern classics (The Lamb, What Sweeter Music ...» More

Details

Here is the little door, lift up the latch, O lift!
We need not wander more but enter with our gift;
Our gift of finest gold,
Gold that was never bought nor sold;
Myrrh to be strewn about His Bed;
Incense in clouds about His Head;
All for the Child that stirs not in His sleep,
But holy slumber holds with ass and sheep.

Bend low about His Bed, for each He has a gift;
See how His eyes awake, lift up your hands, O lift!
For gold, He gives a keen-edged sword
(Defend with it Thy little Lord!)
For incense, smoke of battle red
Myrrh for the honoured happy dead;
Gifts for His children, terrible and sweet,
Touched by such tiny hands and Oh such tiny feet.

Here is the little door, lift up the latch, O lift!
We need not wander more but enter with our gift;
Our gift of finest gold,
Gold that was never bought nor sold;
Myrrh to be strewn about his bed;
Incense in clouds about his head;
All for the Child that stirs not in his sleep.
But holy slumber holds with ass and sheep.

Bend low about his bed, for each he has a gift;
See how his eyes awake, lift up your hands, O lift!
For gold, he gives a keen-edged sword
(Defend with it thy little Lord!),
For incense, smoke of battle red,
Myrrh for the honoured happy dead;
Gifts for his children terrible and sweet,
Touched by such tiny hands and O such tiny feet.

Frances Chesterton (1875-1938)

It has been written of Herbert Howells that ‘he is more widely respected than performed’. Whilst this may sadly be the case with his orchestral and chamber music, it is certainly not true of his organ and choral music.

Herbert Norman Howells (1892–1983) was articled to Herbert Brewer at Gloucester Cathedral in 1905. In 1912 he won an open scholarship to the Royal College of Music where he studied with Stanford and Wood. Howells was to return to the Royal College as a teacher from 1920 and became almost as well known in that capacity and as an examiner and adjudicator as he was as a composer. He succeeded Gustav Holst in 1936 as Director of Music at St Paul’s School in Hammersmith, a post he retained until 1962. In 1950 he was appointed King Edward VII Professor of Music at London University.

Amongst Howells’s self-confessed influences were plainsong, the modes, the pentatonic scale, folksong, his friendship with Ralph Vaughan Williams and a feeling of oneness with the Tudor period. Howells’s music is frequently compared and contrasted with that of his contemporaries, Boughton, Bridge, Delius, Gurney, Holst and Vaughan Williams; the young composer was particularly influenced by the first performance in 1910 of Vaughan Williams’s Fantasia on a theme by Thomas Tallis, which took place in Gloucester Cathedral. Comparisons to Howells’s contemporaries are often unfair and laboured; there are many of Howells’s contemporaries whose music has been strongly affected by some or all of the influences that prevailed upon him. In reality Howells is not a pastiche composer of the twentieth century, but rather a testament to the fruits of the ‘Second English Renaissance’, and a fine composer in his own right.

G K Chesterton suggested to Howells a text by Frances Chesterton entitled Here is the little door. It was indeed this text that the composer set as one of his three small-scale Christmas Carol-Anthems. It was published in 1918 by Stainer & Bell and remains one of the composer’s most popular works.

Here is the little door, lift up the latch, O lift!
We need not wander more but enter with our gift;
Our gift of finest gold,
Gold that was never bought nor sold;
Myrrh to be strewn about his bed;
Incense in clouds about his head;
All for the Child that stirs not in his sleep,
But holy slumber holds with ass and sheep.

Bend low about his bed, for each he has a gift;
See how his eyes awake, lift up your hands, O lift!
For gold, he gives a keen-edged sword
(Defend with it thy little Lord!)
For incense, smoke of battle red
Myrrh for the honoured happy dead;
Gifts for his children, terrible and sweet,
Touched by such tiny hands and O such tiny feet.

Frances Chesterton (1875-1938)

The Three Carol-Anthems, A Spotless Rose, Sing lullaby and Here is the little door were written between 1918 and 1920. Here is the little door sets a tender little poem by Frances Chesterton.

Here is the little door, lift up the latch, oh lift!
We need not wander more but enter with our gift;
Our gift of finest gold,
Gold that was never bought nor sold;
Myrrh to be strewn about His Bed;
Incense in clouds about His Head;
All for the Child that stirs not in His sleep,
But holy slumber holds with ass and sheep.
Bend low about His Bed, for each He has a gift;
See how His eyes awake, lift up your hands, O lift!
For Gold, He gives a keen-edged sword
(Defend with it Thy little Lord!)
For incense, smoke of battle red
Myrrh for the honoured happy dead;
Gifts for His children, terrible and sweet,
Touched by such tiny hands and Oh such tiny feet.

Here is the little door.
Lift up the latch; O lift!
We need not wander more,
but enter with our gift.
A gift of finest Gold,
Gold that was never bought nor sold;
Myrrh to be strewn about his bed;
Incense in clouds about his head;
all for the Child who stirs not in his sleep,
but Holy slumber holds with ass and sheep.
Bend low about his bed: for each he has a gift!
See how his eyes awake – lift up your hands! O lift!
For Gold he gives a keen-edged sword (defend with it thy little Lord)!
For incense, smoke of battle red.
Myrrh for the honoured happy dead.
Gifts for his children, terrible and sweet,
Touched by such tiny hands and oh! such tiny feet.

Frances Chesterton (1875-1938)

Herbert Howells’s choral and organ music has long featured in the repertoire, his carols and short anthems ensuring his fame across the world. Howells was still composing in his 90s; this famous early carol, Here is the little door dates from his earliest period, published in 1918.

A Spotless Rose is blowing,
Sprung from a tender root,
Of ancient seers’ foreshowing,
Of Jesse promised fruit;
Its fairest bud unfolds to light
Amid the cold, cold winter,
And in the dark midnight.

The Rose which I am singing,
Whereof Isaiah said,
Is from its sweet root springing
In Mary, purest Maid;
For through our God’s great love and might,
The Blessed Babe she bare us
In a cold, cold winter’s night.

A Spotless Rose is blowing,
Sprung from a tender root,
Of ancient seers’ foreshowing,
Of Jesse promised fruit;
Its fairest bud unfolds to light
Amid the cold, cold winter,
And in the dark midnight.

The Rose which I am singing,
Whereof Isaiah said,
Is from its sweet root springing
In Mary, purest Maid;
For through our God’s great love and might,
The Blessed Babe she bare us
In a cold, cold winter’s night.

English: Catherine Winkworth

Herbert Howells (1892–1983) is remembered particularly for his contribution to twentieth-century Anglican church music, arguably the finest by any English composer of the century. During World War II he deputized for Robin Orr as organist of St John’s College and was made an honorary fellow of the College in 1966. His carol-anthem A Spotless Rose was composed in a day in 1919 under somewhat prosaic circumstances, as Howells recalled: ‘This I sat down and wrote after idly watching some shunting from a window of a cottage […] in Gloucester which overlooked the Midland Railway […] I looked out on iron railings and the main Bristol–Gloucester line, with shunting trucks bumping and banging.’ The contrasting images of the fourteenth-century text—warmth flooding into the world with Christ’s birth, juxtaposed with the raw cold of a winter’s night—are caught magically in musical terms by the achingly beautiful cadence that concludes the carol.

A Spotless Rose is blowing,
Sprung from a tender root,
Of ancient seers’ foreshowing,
Of Jesse promised fruit;
Its fairest bud unfolds to light
Amid the cold, cold winter,
And in the dark midnight.

The Rose which I am singing,
Whereof Isaiah said,
Is from its sweet root springing
In Mary, purest Maid;
For through our God’s great love and might
The Blessed Babe she bare us
In a cold, cold winter’s night.

The Three Carol-Anthems, A Spotless Rose, Sing lullaby and Here is the little door were written between 1918 and 1920. A Spotless Rose, the most celebrated of the set, was, according to the composer, written:

after idly watching some shunting from the window of a cottage … in Gloucester which overlooked the Midland Railway. In an upstairs room I looked out on iron railings and the main Bristol–Gloucester railway line, with shunting trucks bumping and banging. I wrote it for and dedicated it to my Mother—it always moves me when I hear it, just as if it were written by someone else.

A Spotless Rose is blowing,
Sprung from a tender root,
Of ancient seers’ foreshowing,
Of Jesse promised fruit;
Its fairest bud unfolds to light
Amid the cold, cold winter,
And in the dark midnight.

The Rose which I am singing,
Whereof Isaiah said,
Is from its sweet root springing
In Mary, purest Maid;
For through our God’s great love and might,
The Blessed Babe she bare us
In a cold, cold winter’s night.

A Spotless Rose is blowing,
Sprung from a tender root,
Of ancient seers’ foreshowing,
Of Jesse promised fruit;
Its fairest bud unfolds to light
Amid the cold, cold winter,
And in the dark midnight.
The Rose which I am singing,
Whereof Isaiah said,
Is from its sweet root springing
In Mary, purest Maid;
For through our God’s great love and might
The Blessed Babe she bare us
In a cold, cold winter’s night.

Herbert Howells (1892–1983) studied with Sir Herbert Brewer at Gloucester and, from 1912 to 1917, at the RCM where his mentors were Stanford and Charles Wood. He later made his mark as an organist and director of music, holding the latter post at St Paul’s Girls’ School from 1936 to 1962, where his predecessor had been Gustav Holst. He joined the teaching staff at the RCM in 1920, remaining there until shortly before his death, and was professor of music at London University for ten years from 1954. His magnum opus is the beautiful choral work Hymnus Paradisi. Sing lullaby is the last of the Three Carol-Anthems of the years 1918–1920, the others being Here is the little door and A spotless rose. With its flowing modality it calls to mind the pastoral style of Vaughan Williams but is imbued with Howells’s unmistakable individuality.

The Three Carol-Anthems, A Spotless Rose, Sing lullaby and Here is the little door were written between 1918 and 1920. Sing lullaby was the last to be written and sets a poem by the Gloucestershire poet F W Harvey.

Sing lullaby, while snow doth gently fall,
Sing lullaby to Jesus born in an oxen-stall.
Sing lullaby to Jesus born now in Bethlehem,
The naked blackthorn’s growing to weave his diadem.
Sing lullaby to Jesus. While thickly snow doth fall,
Sing lullaby to Jesus the Saviour of all.